Brooklin Redmen clinch first with last-second win

Beat Oakville Rock 9-8

Redmen vs. Lakers

Ryan Pfeiffer / Metroland

OSHAWA -- Brooklin Redmen Graeme Hossack carried the ball against the Peterborough Lakers during their Major Series Lacrosse game at Iroquois Park Sports Centre. The Lakers beat the Redmen 12-9. July 1, 2014.

BROOKLIN -- Brooklin Redmen GM/head coach Wayne Colley didn’t hesitate in giving credit where it was due for Monday’s last second win in Oakville.

Tied 8-8 with the Rock, the Redmen had the ball and called a timeout with 13 seconds left. Sniper Kyle Matisz emerged as the hero, scoring the winning goal with just three seconds left on the clock. But the guy who gets the credit for calling the play in the timeout is Paul Stewart.

“Paul Stewart drew up the winning goal and they executed it to perfection,” said Colley, who didn’t hesitate in crediting Stewart.

“When we called the timeout we had the ball in our end, so we had to come down the floor to get that,” Colley continued. “It worked to perfection. We had a set play set up and (Matisz) has options off of it. One of the options was wide open so he put it in.”

The game was a tight affair throughout, with the Redmen trailing 3-1 after the first period, but clawing back to tie it a 6-6 after two periods. Goals by Mike Teeter and Kyle Aquin sandwiched around one by Oakville gave the Redmen an 8-7 lead with under five minutes to go, but Oakville tied it with just 45 seconds remaining, setting up the last second heroics.

The goal by Matisz was his only one, but he finished as the top point-getter on the night for the Redmen based on his four assists. Aquin had another goal to give him two on the night, a number matched by Curtis Knight and John Lafontaine. Shayne Jackson had the other goal.

The win snapped a two-game losing streak and improved the Redmen to 12-3-0 on the season. With a six-point bulge on second-place Peterborough and only two games left in the regular season for the Lakers, it clinched first place in the Major Series Lacrosse league. Colley said it will be the first time the Redmen have finished in first place since the 1980s.

“That was one of our goals and we achieved it,” he said of finishing first. “That was a short-term goal, now we have to continue on to our long-term and do well in two sets of playoffs and then the Mann Cup.”

The Redmen continue league play Wednesday night when they host Six Nations at 8 p.m. at the Iroquois Park Sports Centre. Six Nations is in a battle for the fourth and final playoffs spot in the six-team league, tied for third with Kitchener-Waterloo at 14 points each, while Oakville is just two back with 12. Six Nations has a game in hand on both teams.

In the only previous meeting this season, the Redmen won 8-6 back on June 14 over Six Nations, the defending Mann Cup champions.

With just three games left to play, and first place clinched, Colley said there is still work to be done before playoffs start.

“We want to still keep in a rhythm,” he said. “We’re still not quite where I want us to be. We have to work hard to get where we want to go. You can’t take a night off.”

Brooklin will close out the schedule in Kitchener-Waterloo on Sunday, then host Oakville on July 30.